United States or Sudan ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
They therefore set about adjusting the provinces of the magistrates elect, in order that they might be all the more intent on duty. They decreed, that those of the consuls should be Italy, and whatever other place the senate should vote, for every one knew that a war against Antiochus was now a settled point.
On the following year, when the consuls Caius Sulpicius and Caius Licinius Calvus led an army against the Hernicians, and finding no enemy in the country took their city Ferentinum by storm, as they were returning thence, the Tiburtians shut their gates against them.
Artemisia came back full of news which they had imparted: the consuls had fled from Rome; Pompeius was retreating before Cæsar; the latest rumour had it that Domitius was shut up in Corfinium and likely to come off hardly. The words were precious as rubies to Cornelia. She went all that day and the next with her head in the air.
By the same praetor a letter was sent to the consuls, agreeably to a decree of the senate, to the effect that, if they thought proper, one of them should come to Rome to elect consuls; and that he would proclaim the election for whatever day they might name.
And the senate thinks that it will be for the general interests of the republic that the provinces which are at present occupied by Decimus Brutus and by Lucius Plancus, both imperators, and consuls elect, and also by the officers who are in command of provinces, shall continue to be held by them in accordance with the provisions of the Julian law, until each of these officers has a successor appointed by a resolution of the senate; and that they shall take care to maintain those provinces and armies in obedience to the senate and people of Rome, and as a defence to the republic.
By these artifices the law was evaded through the entire year. The consuls Gaius Claudius, the son of Appius, and Publius Valerius Publicola, took over the government from their predecessors in a more tranquil condition. The next year had brought with it nothing new: thoughts about carrying the law, or submitting to it, engrossed the attention of the state.
Such conspicuous merit was felt and rewarded by a discerning prince: the dignity of Boethius was adorned with the titles of consul and patrician, and his talents were usefully employed in the important station of master of the offices. Notwithstanding the equal claims of the East and West, his two sons were created, in their tender youth, the consuls of the same year.
But the custom, the religion, the discipline, the laws of the augurs and the authority of the college, are retained, in obedience to the opinion of the people, and to the great good of the State. Our Consuls, Claudius and Junius, were worthy of all punishment when they put to sea in opposition to the auspices; for men must obey religion, nor can the customs of our country be set aside so easily."
Seen as we see now the period in Rome of which we are writing every safeguard of the Republic gone, all law trampled under foot, Consuls, Prætors, and Tribunes not elected but forced upon the State, all things in disorder, the provinces becoming the open prey of the greediest plunderer it is apparent enough that there could be no longer any hope for a Cicero.
As soon as the ambassadors returned to Rome, the senate ordered one of the consuls to lead his army into Algidum against Gracchus, to the other they assigned as his sphere of action the devastation of the country of the Aequans.
Word Of The Day